More than any other belief, Elizabeth believes that the law of the land does not apply to queens. She wants everyone to think that a queen might make mistakes—might make fatal mistakes in her personal life—and still be fit to rule. If people say that a queen cannot be in love with a married man, where would that leave Elizabeth and Robert Dudley? If people say that an unwanted husband or wife cannot be mercilessly killed, then what adjustment should be made to the coroner’s verdict of the accidental death of Amy Dudley? Elizabeth would like the baby Stuart in her keeping, would like to see his father’s death avenged; but the safety of his mother as a queen is sacrosanct. Nothing matters more to Elizabeth, the daughter of a beheaded queen, than everyone understanding that queens cannot be beheaded. No queen can be beheaded in England ever again.
CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
SUMMER 1567
It is the Scots lords who end the stalemate; they don’t understand the English queen and they ruin their own cause by accident. They announce that their queen, Mary, her royal will broken by miscarrying twin boys in her island prison, has agreed to surrender her rights to the throne. They have made her abdicate in favor of her son, and she has agreed to be as nothing, a prisoner with no title. They think this is their triumph, but it turns Elizabeth against them in a moment. Now she refuses to recognize the little Prince James as King James VI of Scotland. She says he cannot be used to displace his mother, the little boy may not usurp his mother’s throne, a queen cannot be thrown down by her lords. Never, never, never can an heir be put in the place of a monarch—it is the greatest fear of her life. She rails at Cecil, she swears that Queen Mary’s dethronement shall not be allowed. Queens shall be treated with respect, they cannot be judged and found wanting. She will take England to war to defend her fellow queen, Mary.
Now Elizabeth turns on her loudly demanding newly restored cousin Margaret Douglas. Lady Margaret insists that her daughter-in-law Mary Queen of Scots be imprisoned forever, or brought to trial and executed for the abominable crime of husband killing. It hardly matters to her, as long as the baby is brought to England and Lady Margaret can call herself the grandmother of a king and see him inherit the thrones of Scotland and England.
William Cecil plays his long game; he keeps quiet. Outwardly he agrees with the queen that an attack on a fellow royal cannot be borne, but he points out that any invasion of Scotland would probably lead to the Scots lords assassinating the queen at once. They would panic, he says smoothly, looking into Elizabeth’s panic-stricken face. Far better for England to register a temperate protest, negotiate with the self-proclaimed regent, Lord Moray, Mary’s faithless half brother, and try to get the baby sent south when it is convenient.
Of course, the Protestant lords of Scotland are never going to hand their prince over to a dyed-in-the-wool papist such as Margaret Douglas. Of course, Lady Margaret, having ruined one son, should never be entrusted with another. Elizabeth is so frustrated by events that she will not speak to her great advisor or her beloved cousin; and I have more grounds than ever to predict that she will turn towards us. She has to turn to us. What other family is left to her?
CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
SUMMER 1567
There is Katherine, imprisoned at Gosfield Hall, innocent of any crime, beloved by half of England, her boy being raised as a royal Seymour in hiding. There is Mary, imprisoned at Lochleven, probably a murderer, certainly an adulterer, hated by half of England and a horror to her own coreligionists, her boy held by her half brother, her husband on the run. Who is the better choice of heir? Which is the better choice for England? Of course Elizabeth in her monstrous perversity supports Mary and calls for her release.
The Scots take her money but make no progress, Cecil smoothly blocks any hopes of an English invasion of Scotland. Elizabeth’s resolve falters. Cecil suggests that she goes on progress, Robert Dudley promises her an idyllic summer—why should she not be happy? Elizabeth sets the disaster of her cousin to one side and rides out beside her lover, running away from trouble again.
CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
SUMMER 1567
The swallows arrive in the gardens of Chequers and fly low in the evening. I can hear the nightingale singing in the wood at twilight. Summer is the hardest time to be imprisoned. I feel as if everything is free and living its life, singing at dusk, but me. I feel as if every living thing is seeking its mate and finding joy—everything, everyone—but me and my sister.
I am very low this evening. I usually try to read, or decorate my cramped room with drawings on the walls, or study my Bible or my sister Jane’s writings, but this evening I stand on a chair at the open window and rest my chin on my hands and look out over the darkening horizon to where the solitary star comes out like a pinhead of silver against a dark blue silk gown, and I know that I am far from my family and far from my friends, and I will never see the man that I love again. Never in this life.
I can feel my face is wet with my tears and I know that this is no way for me to spend the evening. I will feel no better for this in the morning, I will have learned nothing by diving to the depth of my sorrow. I am not the sort of woman who says that she always feels better for a good cry. I rather despise that sort of woman. I usually keep myself busy and occupied, and avoid moments of grief for my loss of liberty and the loss of my sisters and the terrible blight that has been laid on our family because we were born Tudor. I pat my face with my sleeve and I search in myself for Jane’s holy certainty, or even my mother’s flinty determination. I cannot be tenderhearted and vulnerable like Katherine or I will simply despair like her.
I am about to swing the window shut and put myself to bed to try to sleep through to another day, so that these lingering lonely hours of the night are escaped. I reach out and put my hand on the latch of the window and then I hear horses coming down the road, several horses, perhaps six, a troop of men riding down the London road to Chequers. These are the hoofbeats that I have waited for. I strain my ears to listen. Yes, definitely, they have not gone past. They turn in towards the house and now I am leaning out of the window, staring into the half-light to see if there is a standard going before them, and whose colors are coming at a brisk trot at this time of the evening.
If someone has come for me, out of the summer dusk, someone determined to see us free, someone taking a chance with Elizabeth on progress and Cecil snatching a week at his new home, then I will go with him, whoever he is. If he takes me to poverty in France or Spain, if he involves me in danger and rebellion, then I will go. I will not spend another summer here, caged like one of Katherine’s linnets. I will not stay. I don’t care if we die as we ride to the coast, or if our ship is captured and sunk at sea. I would rather drown than spend another night in this little bed looking at the white ceiling and my scratched drawings on the walls. I would rather die tonight than live another day in prison.
The riders come around the bend in the track, and now I can see them. The Tudor standard goes before them. It is no outlaw, but a message from Elizabeth. It is brought by a lord riding among his guard on the queen’s business. At last, at last, this must be my freedom. It can only be that she is setting me free. Any other command and it would be a single messenger at a leisurely pace. At last, God be praised, God be praised for it, she is setting me free and I am going to ride out from this damned house and I will never set foot in it again.